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“Virtual Reality is a new art form”, said multiple Oscar-winning Alejandro G. Inarritù in his acceptance speech when he received another Academy Award for his VR installation “Carne y Arena” in November 2017.

Numerous filmmakers and artists use this new medium. Their work is shown at international film festivals, museums and art exhibitions. Virtual worlds are magical. The users become part of the magical virtual world and its story. You must experience VR; it cannot be described.

Everyone was invited to experience these new worlds and was given the opportunity to get immersed in them. The i4c presented a carefully curated exhibition of current artistic experiences and accompanying lectures. We stepped into an enchanted world that appeals to all senses and have experienced the beginnings of a new medium. We discovered and discussed virtual worlds, 360° films and the magic of immersive perception.

The program was developed by Astrid Kahmke in collaboration with art historian Tina Sauerländer.

i4c 2018 Speakers

Mélodie Mousset

Mélodie Mousset is a french artist based in Zurich, Switzerland. Oscillating between virtual and physical realms Mélodie’s work focus on the physicality of the human body and the potential virtuality of the mind. Her investigations develop through numerous mediums, including: performance, video, installation, photography, sculptures and interactive media. She received the Swiss art award for her first VR installation “We were looking for ourselves in each other” in 2015 and her work is regularly exhibited internationally. Mélodie is a regular visiting professor at ECAL, Switzerland since 2015. She has studied at EBAR (FR), ECAL (CH), RCA (UK) and completed her Master of Fine Arts at CALARTS (USA) in 2012.

Tamiko Thiel

Tamiko Thiel is a visual artist exploring the interplay of place, space, the body, cultural memory and identity. She is internationally recognized as a pioneer in virtual reality (since 1994, creating an online VR world for seriously ill children in collaboration with Steven Spielberg) and augmented reality (since 2010, with an intervention into MoMA NY), developing the dramatic and poetic capabilities of to create spaces of memory for exploring social and cultural issues. Her early VR work is featured in books such as Whitney curator Christiane Paul's ”Digital Art“, Stanford professor Matthew Smith's ”The Total Work of Art: From Bayreuth to Cyberspace“ and DAM Gallery director Wolf Lieser's book ”The World of Digital Art“.

Tina Sauerlaender

Tina Sauerlaender is a curator and writer based in Berlin. She focuses on the impact of the digital and the internet on individual environments and society. With her exhibition hub peer to space she has been organizing international group shows, e.g The Unframed World. Virtual Reality as Artistic Medium for the 21st Century at HeK Basel in 2017. She is co-founder of Radiance, an online platform for artistic VR experiences. She is a PhD candidate at The University of Art and Design Linz, Austria, and a board member of the media arts society in Berlin.

www.peertospace.eu www.radiancevr.co www.medienkunstverein.com

Bianca Kennedy

Bianca Kennedy studied art at the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich and completed her diploma with a Meisterschüler-degree (2017). Scholarships have brought her to North America, Barcelona, Athens and Tokyo. Kennedy's videos, drawings and site-specific installations were shown at Kunstverein Munich, Kuandu Museum Taipei, C-Gallery Milan and Colombo Art Biennale in Sri Lanka among others.

Bernhard Sinkel

His cinematic debut as writer, director and producer, ”Lina Braake“ (1975) brought him great success and has won numerous awards. His feature films ”Taugenichts“, ”Deutschland im Herbst“ and ”Kaltgestellt“ were invited to numerous international festivals. For television, in the 1980s he created mini-series such as ”Felix Krull“, ”Hemingway“ and ”Fathers and Sons“. Bernhard Sinkel staged for the Opera in the 1990s and writes novels today. He is head of the Film and Media Art Department of the Bavarian Academy of Fine Arts.

Edgar Reitz

Filmmaker, author and university professor. Member of the ”Oberhausen Group“, which evoked the German author's film in 1962. His ”Heimat Tetralogy“ is world-famous. It consists of 31 full-length individual films and is one of the most comprehensive narrative works in film history. 2012 the German-French cinema co-production ”Die Aandere Heimat – Chronik einer Sehnsucht“ is produced. Edgar Reitz has been awarded with film prizes all over the world and has received honorary doctorates from various European universities.

Felix Kraus

Felix Kraus is the founder of The Swan Collective and studied media art at the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich and HfG Karlsruhe. The group mixes different techniques like Virtual Reality animations, painting, paper embossment, literature and performance. Works of the collective were shown in places like Kunstmuseum Stuttgart, C-Gallery Milan,Alessandro Casciaro in Bolzano, Kunsthalle Schweinfurt and the Egyptian Museum Munich.

Sönke Kirchhof

Sönke Kirchhof is CEO and executive producer of award-winning VR Full Service Studio INVR.SPACE GmbH and in charge of all business-related operations as well as deciding on creative and technologic approaches. He works in the fields of VR, stereoscopic filmmaking, VFX and CGI Postproduction as well as Research and Development in arts and technology since more than 15 years. He is also founder of reallifefilm international GmbH, working as Producer and Stereographer in all kind of projects.

Dani Levy

Dani Levy is a.o. together with Tom Tykwer a co-founder of X Filme Creative Pool. The writer and director is known for his films “Meschugge”, “Mein Führer – die wirklich wahrste Wahrheit über Adolf Hitler” and “Alles auf Zucker”, for which he won many awards, including the German Film Award and the Ernst Lubitsch Award. In May 2018 he created his first fictional 360°/VR series “Jerusalem Stories: Faith, Love, Hope, Fear”, which he produced in collaboration with Medea Film Factory, Jewish Museum Berlin, and ZDF / ARTE.

Christian Felder

Christian Felder is an experienced storyteller, creative and producer. With 20 years of professional experience as DOP, editor and director for broadcasting and digital media productions. His clients include almost all renowned international broadcasters, agencies and major brands. From his expertise as a compositor for virtual studios, visuals, design and graphics, his work increasingly leads to VR with trend-setting 360° storytelling: he integrates techniques of design thinking, experiments within the creative process with new perspectives and innovative technical methods that give viewers new food for thought.

Daniel Man

Born in London 1969, childhood in London and Hongkong, moved to Germany aged seven. Graffiti-Writer since 1984, among first Writers in Germany. Academies of fine arts in Brunswig and Munich. Shows: Gallery Sprüth Magers Lee London, De Pury & Luxembourg Zürich, Weserburg Museum Bremen, Von der Heydt Museum Wuppertal, Lenbachhaus München.

“The Networking in the Graffiti-scene was one of the best experiences I made in my life. To be in the scene is like having a family and this is a global one. Painting together side by side is an intense collaboration.”

“One key to my artwork is to ask where we are located. It’s a question about space. Finding answers to this is like completing our own invented three-dimensional jigsaw puzzle. These kind of complex structures give me the sight of an overview, how we are transconnected, taking and giving influences. This is what I’m reflecting in my work.”

Johannes Steurer

Johannes Steurer is head of the Future Trends & Technology research and development at ARRI, where he is responsible for research cooperations and innovations in the field of future recording techniques (3D recording, depth maps, light field, 360° and volumetric recording). He has held various positions at ARRI since 1994. Former activities at IRT and Signum Computer, Munich. Studies of electrical engineering and information technology, doctorate at the Technical University of Munich. Ongoing teaching and reviewing activities. FKTG and SMPTE member. Awards from the Advanced Imaging Society, AMPAS, Cinec, FKTG and SMPTE.

Irene Höfer

Irene Höfer studied film and television. Worked on movie and TV productions. Author and producer of many film portraits, including Michael Ballhaus, Wim Wenders, Udo Jürgens. Founded Medea Film Factory in 1995. Irene Höfer finds compelling narrative structures for documentary and feature films. That includes the visualization of art and culture using innovative, cross-media formats. With Dani Levy, Irene Höfer developed the fictional 3D 360-degree series, “Stories from Jerusalem.”

Andreas Oestreich

Andreas Oestreich studied interactive media at the Augsburg University of Applied Sciences and joined Arri Media in 2011 as a CG artist. His main focus was on media installations at trade fairs and other major events around the world. Most recently he was Technical Director responsible for 3D simulation, compositing and post production workflow. In 2016, he joined Arri’s Future Trends and Technology working group for camera development, where he is responsible for configuration and workflows of 360° and VR camera systems.

Jürgen Dudowits

Jürgen Dudowits developed the first computer games and graphic computer applications as early as 1983 and developed and established the MDH degree programme in Game Design at the beginning of the 2000s. Above all, he has always promoted the topic of 3D, with focus on interactive 3D real-time applications, 3D web worlds and virtual reality. For over a decade he has been working alongside Prof. Dr. Gerd Hirzinger and other technology partners on the “Virtual Bavaria” project. He has received numerous awards, including the ANIMAGO Award three times

Astrid Kahmke

With a background as creative film producer of international feature films, Astrid works for the Bavarian Film Center since 2012. She has developed innovative training formats such as the ”Immersive Storytelling Hackathon“, ”story:first - digital storytelling lab“ or the Writers’ Room:Lab. Since 2016 she curates the international i4c events in Munich and is head of the first European training for artistic developers, the xR Creators’ Lab.

Experiences

HanaHana 花華

HanaHana 花華 is an artistic VR experience by the contemporary artist Mélodie Mousset. An early prototype developed together with VR engineer Naëm Baron was finished early 2017. HanaHana 花華 takes its name and inspiration from the manga “One Piece” in which the character Nico Robin has the power to infinitely sprout and replicate her own body parts on any visible surfaces thanks the magic of the Hana Hana no Mi devil fruit. The VR game grants the player with the powers of Nico Robin to experience for themselves the excitement, the awe, the fear, emerging with the multiplication of our physical body in the digital space.

Land of Cloud

Three days journey beyond Space and Time lies the Land of Cloud. The people there are silent, transfixed by ”Cloud Mirrors“, through wh.ich Cloud Deities speak in their stead. Walk among them, place your head in theirs and hear the shifting soundscape of the Cloud Deities' admonitions. The Land of Cloud is a beautiful garden, but the Cloud People are oblivious to their surroundings. They stare into their devices, motionless, spellbound by whispers from The Cloud. The garden slowly envelops them in its boughs. VR with Spatial Sound Experience for HTC Vive.

Rhizomat VR

It is the future, and democracy has been replaced by the all-embracing corporate rule of the Institute for Method (IFM). People’s thoughts are monitored by regular standard examinations. But the standard examinations do not always go according to plan.

Face of a Place

”Face of a Place“ is an interactive VR experience in which users can observe and explore the historical dimensions of the Berliner Reichstag building from different perspectives and in different time epochs. The photorealistic 360° world of images is created in a collage of 3D scans, photos, videos and sounds.

”Face of a Place“ is presented by reallifefilm international and co-financed by Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg.

VR All in This Together

In her 360° animation ”VR All In This Together“, Bianca Kennedy combine analog drawings with animated movements, creating an immersive bathing experience. The theatrical staging of the bathtub has been the artist's main theme for two years. The tub not only seems to be a safe place where people expose themselves – in an environment that feels like they are in the womb – it is also a place where you have time to think.

In her three-channel video work ”We’re all in this together“, which can be understood as a precursor of the 360° video, Bianca Kennedy collected found footage of bathing film stars and analyses the use of the bathtub in feature films. In this 360° animation, it is now possible for the viewer to leave his place as a voyeur and bathe with six different people at the same time, based on the artist’s drawings.

Here We Are – A Turing Torture

The user is surrounded by painted architecture, based on digitized acrylic paintings by the artist group ”The Swan Collective“. The accompanying voice of an all-powerful programmer tries to convince the viewer that he/she is not a human being, but an artificial intelligence implanted in a social media app. The audience’s memories of a life before the VR experience had been written by a team of authors. The VR experience uses its potential to take over the human senses in order to make the viewer powerless against the arbitrariness of the programmer.

Sergent James

It is Leo’s bedtime. When his mum goes to switch off the light, the little boy thinks there is something under his bed …

​Leo: Will you leave the light on, please? Mummy: Why, darling? Leo: I … I think there is something under my bed …

Wild Gardens

The augmented reality installation ”Wild Gardens“ is a form of guerilla gardening, popping up in barren parts of the city, often mimicking or mocking the architecture of the site. It is a surreal, computer generated landscape with which Thiel blurs the boundaries between physical and virtual realities to bring empty parts of the city to (virtual) life. Walk around Max-Joseph-Platz and see the square transformed in the display of your smartphone!

Originally created for the Neue Sammlung@Pinakothek der Moderne, for the Long Night of the Museums, October 2017.

Your Spiritual Temple Sucks

Mr Chang arrives to his “Spiritual Temple”, a place that represents one’s destiny. To solve his marital crisis and financial problems, he summons his guardian – The Thunder God. They attempt to tidy his life, which turns out to be a big mistake … with hilarious consequences.

Fat Cap

The mini documentary ”Fat Cap“ tells the story of the artists of the Scale festival. The graffiti artist Daniel Man has brought the international stars of the mural scene to Munich for this project. ”Scale“ means scale, extent, scale - these terms refer to the central core of this extraordinary art project. The 360° film shows them in their natural habitat, on the wall. They tell about their work, about the magic and freedom they find in their work.

Jerusalem – Faith, Love, Hope, Fear

The four episodes ”Faith“, ”Love“, ”Hope“ and ”Fear“ by director Dani Levy talk about life in the Middle East conflict – sometimes from an Israeli, sometimes Palestinian perspective. By using the special 360-degree and virtual reality technology in 3D, the viewer is involved and can get to know the extraordinary city of Jerusalem even more directly. The ”Stories from Jerusalem“ are part of the exhibition ”Welcome to Jerusalem“ at the Jewish Museum Berlin.

Inside Auschwitz

More than 70 years have passed since the liberation of ”Auschwitz“, a synonym for the Holocaust, for Nazi atrocities and for mass murder. With the aid of 360° technology, the personal experiences of three Holocaust survivors can be directly linked to the huge dimensions of Auschwitz. The users can be ”inside“ the story and can connect emotionally strongly with the stories and feelings of the three Holocaust-Survivors we portrayed.

Step to the Line

Shot entirely on location in California maximum-security prisons, “Step to the Line” provides a new perspective on prisoners, the correctional system, and even yourself. In this project, we see how release from incarceration can be just as jarring as intake, and how parallel lives diverge when someone serves time.

Directed by Ricardo Laganaro, and produced by Oculus in association with Defy Ventures, “Step to The Line,” premiered at the 2017 Tribeca Film Festival.

Virtual Bavaria

The Realtime 3D-experience is presented by vr-dynamix.com and shows a section of the project Virtual Bavaria, an immersive and interactive journey through the fascinating “Wintergarden of Ludwig II”, a long forgotten exotic jungle paradise on the roof of the Munich Residenz and splendid baroque halls of the Wuerzburg Residenz. The VR-scenes have been generated by re-engineering, laserscans and photogrammetry.

Bodypaint & Substance

Giulia Bowinkel and Friedemann Banz focus on the medium of computer and its influence on humanity in their work. Here, the focus is on the perception of the world. People understand it as reality, and it is simulated by the computer. Banz & Bowinkel thereby challenge this notion of reality as a simulation, changing human perception of the world.

The series “Bodypaint” and “Substance” show simulations of fluids, surfaces, materials and textures. To generate the shapes, Banz & Bowinkel use recorded movements from a performance session in the studio and transfer them to an avatar, who then paints the movements as liquids in a virtual space.

The computer-generated images are extended by a second level, which can be experienced via an Augmented Reality App. Parallel facets of the respective simulations appear on the screen of the smartphone.

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Picture credit: portraits – copyrights by the speakers, Kathrin Schäfer, HFF Munich University of Television and Film – Jens Weber, Robert Pupeter, Lindner Group

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